Dynamics of Social, Political, and Economic Institutions

Organized by Avinash Dixit, Eva M. Meyersson Milgrom, Paul Milgrom

December 3-4, 2010Irvine, California

Meeting Overview:Study of institutions that underpin political, social, and economic interactions is flourishing in all social sciences. Political scientists face the perennial issue of balancing the needs of effective decision-making and the necessary constraints on arbitrary exercise of power. Economists have begun to examine the formal and informal legal structures that protect property rights and enforce contracts. Scholars of law and jurisprudence have contributed to our understanding of institutions in both of these fields: constitutions and legislative and case law, as well as arbitration and other mechanisms of private order that function under the shadow of the law. Sociologists study the networks that constitute the structure of social interactions and the norms that govern their function. Anthropologists examine the workings of these institutions and organizations in different cultures and compare them across cultures; historians do the same for past societies.